Madonna lands three ‘Rebel’ tracks on Hot Dance/Electronic Songs
Three of the songs from Rebel Heart debuted on the Hot Dance/Electronic Songs chart right after their arrival, Billboard.com reports.
They are Unapologetic Bitch at #26, Living for Love at #16 and Bitch I’m Madonna at #14. They mark Madonna’s debut on Hot Dance/Electronic Songs, a chart which premiered in January 2013.
Reconstructing the sequence of events that followed the massive demo leak of last week, Billboard explains that the songs were released digitally in a surprise move at midnight on Friday December 19, available for instant download upon pre-ordering the album or as a la carte purchases. The songs soar onto the chart, therefore, on the strength of only a partial week of sales and with only small benefits from other metrics like streaming, radio airplay and club play.
Bitch I’m Madonna, featuring Nicki Minaj, leads with sales of 12,000 downloads, according to Nielsen Music. Living For Love, the album’s first proper single, starts with 10,000 sold and Unapologetic Bitch follows with 7,000. The tracks begin on Dance/Electronic Digital Songs at nos. 9, 12 and 14, respectively, making Madonna notch her first top 10 on the list, which launched in January 2010.
Billboard also reports that two versions of Living For Love, the album original and an instrumental, shipped to club DJs on the evening of December 21 with remixes currently in production and ready to be sent out once approved by Madonna.
As for radio airplay, top 40 has so far not warmed to Living For Love. It’s received a mere 10 plays at the format (through Dec. 23) (led by KMXV Kansas City, which has sampled it three times). Then again, Interscope Records serviced the song at midnight, Monday morning as a soft sell. An Interscope source tells Billboard that the label will re-service the song after New Year’s and decide on an official “add” date shortly thereafter. Surely the song’s rush release and Christmas week timing, when many programmers are on vacation, play into radio’s general lack of interest in the song so far.
Madonna last reached the Pop Songs airplay chart in 2012, when Give Me All Your Luvin’ and Girl Gone Wild reached Nos. 24 and 38, respectively.
Read the full article by Gordon Murray with additional reporting by Keith Caulfield and Gary Trust on Billboard.com.
